Chapter 9: Hail

Odette's POV

I opened the kitchen door with a candle in my hand and Gabriel Cordero stood on the step, soaked to the skin.

Behind him the rain came down in white sheets.

"The power's out," I said.

"I know. The whole block."

"You're drenched."

"I know that too."

I stepped back and he came in, and water ran off his jacket onto the floor.

I lit a second candle from the first and set both on the counter.

He did not take off his jacket. He stood in the middle of my mother's kitchen with his hands hanging and his hair stuck to his forehead.

"I have to tell you something," he said, "and I'm afraid you won't want me in the room after."

"Is this about your mother?"

"Partly."

"Then say it."

He opened his mouth.

Something hard struck the roof, and then something else.

Then another, and another, until it was one roar.

"Hail," I said.

It was loud enough that we both looked up at the ceiling. A pane in the back door cracked with a small sharp pop.

He moved before I did. He crossed the kitchen in two strides and put his body between me and the window, his arm across my shoulders.

A hailstone the size of a walnut bounced off the porch rail and rolled across the floor.

We stood there until it stopped, his jacket dripping onto my sleeve.

Then it was quiet, only the rain, and the candles.

I realized I had been holding his wrist.

"Say it," I said.

"Odette."

"Whatever it is. Say it now, before I lose my nerve and you lose yours."

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